Development of a clean and energy self sustained building in the vision of integrating H2 economy with renewable energy sources

FP7 RESEARCH PROJECT

Our concept is the development of an intelligent, self-sustained and zero CO2 emission hybrid energy system to cover electric power, heating and cooling loads (tri-generation) of either residential/commercial buildings or districts of buildings. In the proposed system, the primary energy will be harvested from RES and directly used to cover contingent loads, while the excess energy will be converted to hydrogen to be used as energy storage material and to be further applied as a green fuel to cover the building heating needs through direct combustion or to produce combined heating and electricity by means of fuel cells.

Why is hydrogen so important for Europe?

...We have some difficult choices to make - and we have some difficult steps to take. Cleaning up our conventional fossil based energy systems and introducing new ones will be complex, inconvenient, and expensive....
It is clear that we have to research, develop, demonstrate, validate and plan for alternative energy systems now. We need transition solutions that will have an impact in the shorter term and we also need longer term solutions. That is where hydrogen as an energy carrier, comes in! ...
Only industry has the capacity to develop the products and invest in their production. But the public side has a crucial role in providing the initial funds for research ...
In short, hydrogen ticks all the right boxes in terms of the global policy benefits it can bring. It may, or may not be the “Holy Grail” for energy, but I am convinced that it will play a major role in our future energy systems.
...the challenges and opportunities are out there – I urge you to work with us now to turn our vision into reality.